Phantom
by Dokuhan
Summary: At a Halloween party, Speedy takes note of Aqualad's costume.


Okay, so maybe this wasn't _the _stupidest idea in the world.

Sure, when Karen had first brought up the idea of a Titans Halloween party Roy had rolled his eyes and complained a bit. It wasn't like she bothered to listen though, what with the twins incessant gleeful chattering when she announced it. He had hoped Garth of all people would side with him, but the Atlantean had just sat there in deep thought – well, after being clarified on what Halloween was exactly. So Roy's protests were quickly drowned out and he was stuck going to some lame-ass shindig at the Westies' tower. How fun.

He hadn't really put any effort into a costume, unlike his own team and Titans West whom had decided to go all out, and chose to just wear his normal clothes plus sunglasses with his hair spiked up, claiming to be some kind of "punk". A last minute costume deemed barely passable by the bumblebitch in the fairy costume. What was the huge deal? He was _seventeen_, way too old for any of this dressing up crap.

A few hours into the party though, his mood seemed to pick up a bit. Sure it wasn't the best party he had ever been too (although the "best" ones certainly weren't "hero appropriate"), but it was still nice to act like a somewhat _normal_ teenager. Well, aside for a few odd skin tones and uniforms that were in close proximity. Roy had missed opportunities like this, back when he was just a sidekick and not a fulltime hero.

And he had to admit, it was pretty damn funny when he saw that Dick and Kory had simply switched costumes. Talk about literally getting into each other's pants, he still didn't think he deserved the punch when he asked if his lookalike was wearing her panties too. Sure, the Boy Wonder could claim it was because they lost a bet – he was fully welcome to denial that he just wanted to wear a skirt. Saying that had earned him a pretty harsh kick.

It was Garth's costume that had caught his attention the most though. He had been keeping it under-wraps until that night, and it definitely had been well planed and thought out. His long black hair had been pulled back in a low ponytail and he wore some kind of suit. Along with the black gloves and white mask covering the top right half of his face, he was an almost perfect imitation of the Phantom. Without the deformities and compulsion to kidnap female opera singers of course, that would have been silly.

Still, he wasn't exactly sure why the costume surprised him. Apparently when he had been Aquaman's sidekick, Aqualad had only been taught the basics of survival as their missions tended to stick to the sea. When Karen found out just how much Garth _didn't _know about the surface world, she would spend any free moment possible trying to integrate him into pop culture. Of course Roy was dragged into plenty of these "movie nights", sometimes reluctantly, sometimes not so much. Musical night had been the bane of his existence, well not his _whole_ existence, but he had still been dragged into that. His fascination lay more in how engrossed in The Phantom of the Opera Garth had been than the movie itself. He would have been lying if he said it wasn't kind of endearing, was that the right kind of word? Yeah that worked, endearing.

Although, he would have also been lying if he didn't admit that by the end of the movie he was laughing at Garth and Karen's "girly" embrace as the mourned over "poor Erik". Again, something he thought he didn't deserved a punch in the arm for.

Nonetheless, of course Garth would choose that for a costume. It was simple in some ways and elegant in others, kind of like him if you really thought about it. Maybe that's why he kept staring, because it seemed like just such a perfect fit – and not because he was attracted, no way. Like he would be attracted to _Gilhead_. That was just stupid. There was no way he could be attracted to _him_, even if he did look just as good in that suit as he did in his wet suit.

…

No! No! That was totally not what he intended. Stupid thought process and its trying to confuse him.

"You know, Roy, I know your manners aren't the best but I thought you would know how rude staring is." When had Garth turned to face him? Had they been facing each other the whole time? Smooth, Harper, _smooth_.

"Why would I be staring at you? Maybe I just happened to be looking in the same direction." He rolled his eyes behind the sunglasses and huffed, "Besides, your costume is really…convincing. It's actually a kind of creepy." That was the closest he could get to a compliment and it was true! If Garth suddenly started playing the organ while acting like some emo kid, then they'd have a problem.

"Really?" Garth smirked a bit and removed his hand from his hip, at least the Phantom didn't make such _gay _poses. The masked teen walked around him before wrapping his arms around his waist and leaning close to his ear. He sang in soft tenor, "_Softly, deftly, music shall caress you. Hear it, feel it secretly posses you._"

Roy squirmed and scowled a bit as Garth hummed quietly, "Cut it out." Damn he had a nice voice. No! Wait! Don't think like that! He was ready to scream, why did Garth have to be so fucking…dashing! And since when did he start using words like "dashing" anyway? Oh that's right, since Garth started messing _with his mind_!

Somewhere along the line, he had been turned around so they could face each other. Garth gave a small smile as he finished, "_You alone can make my song take flight. Help me make the music of the night_."

Roy didn't have a chance to react before their lips pressed together, he just found himself kissing back. He managed to free his own arms enough to wrap them around Garth's waist. As they pulled apart he pressed their foreheads together. "You can be a real ass, you know that right?"

"Maybe, but at least I'm yours."

"We'll see about that later." He snickered a bit at how red his Phantom became before they were connected once more.

Yeah, maybe this wasn't the stupidest idea in the world.

-

Graaaah. Damn you plot bunnies.

Anyway, there's a bit of a story about how this came about. See in my History of Music (and Musical Theater) class we were supposed to watch the Lion King, but after two DVD fails we just went right into The Phantom of the Opera. So after the second day of watching it, I'm sitting in my Psychology class when all of the sudden the image of Aqualad dressed as Erik came into my head, followed by a few images in this fic, and of course they _wouldn't go away_. So after I finally decided what kind of costume to give Roy, this came about!

I tried to go from Speedy's point of view, but I'm not sure how great it came out since I'm used to writing more in the third-person-omnipresent instead of limited. It's also unbetaed D: sorry! I'm sure my grammar is somewhat decent though.

Oh and those of you waiting for chapter two of Mourning Morning, I'm working on it. I've run into a bit of Writer's Block in where I know what I want to say, it's just putting it into words and keeping it in character that suck. Hopefully that'll be done soon!

Thanks for reading! Please review, feedback feeds me.

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, everything belongs to respective copyright owners or whatevs. **


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